3 Years Today (+ Our Time in QLD) in Days of My Destiny

Three years since we moved today.

I want to write about our time in Queensland recently.

Friday 7th Nov - we travelled to QLD, arrived at our own house at the end of our (usual and) long trip. What a RELIEF to be able to arrive, not just to Queensland, not just to a place where we weren’t being “hosted”, but to OUR OWN HOME!!! It felt amazing!!! And so natural and wholesome!! Unfortunately we noticed a few things around the house.... our last tenants were dodgy and there was a lot of violence and aggression and drug dealing going on there. We saw a terribly patched hole in the wall between the kitchen and our bedroom. I found two cigarette burns on the toilet seat that L himself installed in our home a few years ago. I remember it was so hard to get the money for that toilet, and it was such a necessity because before that, we were using the outside toilet in the middle of winter. And now it has cigarette burns on it because of some careless, thoughtless, selfish people. The insulation is gone from the roof cavity. Everyone we’ve told this to has reacted with such shock and WTF faces. Like, “WHY would anyone DO that???” kind of reactions, which was our reaction exactly. Again, L had worked so damn hard for that extra $500 it took to buy that insulation 6 years ago and we installed it ourselves. We had to wear these suits that looked like we were about to go to space, it was so funny, and so before getting down to business, we’d taken photos of us being stupid in these suits. There are photos of my doing a warrior pose, a photo of L half coming out of a (clean) wheelie bin..... just silly things like that. And now the insulation is all gone. All because of some careless, thoughtless, selfish people. There is one bedroom with carpet in it. It was a carpet that - again - L worked so hard for. We paid for someone to lay it in the room that was to be M’s once Little L came along. It was a nice, creamy colour. And now it has dog urine stains all over it and scratch marks near the door. It’s as though they locked a little dog in there and in its desperation, it scratched away at the carpet. All because of some careless, thoughtless, selfish people.
The kitchen benches felt grimy and at 10pm, I was dead tired but also had some adrenalin pumping through me as I vigorously scrubbed away the scum that was in my house. I could not go to bed until I knew this place was Home. I couldn’t stop until I knew that it was up to MY standard, the way I always had it, the way I had left it and the way it should be. We found some kind of drain cleaner stuff, about 6 bottles of it neatly stored in one of the kitchen benches. Who KNOWS what they did with that. There was a thick, black curtain in the kitchen. I never had a curtain in the kitchen because I liked looking out at the trees while I did the dishes. But not these tenants. Whatever they were doing behind closed doors was to STAY behind closed doors. This curtain STANK. We threw it out immediately. L found a sharp knife hidden on top of the pantry. It had black tape all along the handle. (I guess so they could throw away the finger prints?? No idea how that works.)
We went to bed, exhausted, happy and frustrated.

Saturday 8th Nov - I went to mum’s with the girls and hung out there for the day. I don’t really remember that day. I tend to forget what happens at mum’s, because usually, not much actually happens! But I’m sure it was a lovely time. L had stayed at our house to begin the cleaning process downstairs. Basically when we moved down here, we had 3 weeks to pack up the entire house. L therefore had left all his tools and timber under the house, somewhat safely locked away. In the last 3 years when we’ve gone back to visit, occasionally L has grabbed some of his stuff but there was still a lot of timber left there. Mostly the timber was for the unfinished projects he had going, such as the deck and stairs. We’d been told by our neighbours that it looked like the tenants had entered that area (they weren’t supposed to and we had a separate padlock and key for it). Well they sure had. L found syringes under there that day. They had their caps on… but what if they didn’t? They’d been hidden in obscure places. It shook L up a bit. The grossest thing he found was a used tampon among the timber. I really felt sorry for him. I mean on the one hand, as landlords you KNOW there’s a risk that comes with renting out a house. On the other hand, we had nowhere else to keep all that timber all this time and you’d like to think that your tenants would generally respect the areas that aren’t accessible to them - I know we did when we rented. But to find a used tampon is just the lowest of all lows. Especially among the timber that you worked hard for!! I remember L would spend whole days on weekends, doing electrical work for a guy he knew out west, who happened to be a lumberjack (not sure what the modern word for this is) and paid L in timber. It was quite a decent deal in the end, because it was with this very timber that L was able to build a beautiful big deck on the front of our house, at a time when we should’ve had no money to be able to do that! And we DIDN’T have any money, lol, that’s the thing!! So the deal was perfect.

After hanging out at mum’s, I made my way back to our house as I had planned to spend that night with my friends. I wanted them to come over, to bring their camping chairs and $20 to put towards pizza. It was going to be a casual night to loosely celebrate my 30th. Really I just wanted to celebrate my FRIENDS, it had been way too long. Two of my friends couldn’t make so I had organized to catch up with them some other time. Normally I wouldn’t do this because I figure, “you know what, I’ve travelled all this way, you really need to make an effort,” but this time around was different. I’ve missed my friends, the ones who REALLY know me and accept me with my flaws and quirks. The ones that love me without judgment. I don’t know why but I feel a lot of judgment around here, even at times where I know there might NOT be any judgment happening. I guess it’s what happens when you live in a small town with generally small-minded people, I don’t know. Anyway I’d been missing my friends and I wanted to make an effort for them too. Tracey from Uni showed up. I hadn’t seen her in almost a year. I’ve seen her less than 5 times since I moved away, and each time it’s been… weird. She’s either been with another friend as well, it could’ve been someone I didn’t really know and/or expect to be there and so it changed the dynamics, or I was with some other friends of my own, and so she’d go into herself a bit. The truth is we hadn’t had a proper catch-up until this night when she showed up and I squealed and ran up to her and we hugged so so tightly. I got all excited and nervous then, because when I arrived home, Matt & Liv were already there and I had wanted to have a shower and put on make-up etc, have time to get ready! And then Tracey showed up!!! So I was all excited and nervous and kept feeling inadequate, kept saying how dumb I looked and how all I could see was all my wrinkles and so on, lol. Tracey stopped me in my tracks, grabbed my hands, looked square into my eyes and said, “Stop. You’re fine. You look BEAUTIFUL.” And that was JUST what I needed!!!! [The thing is… even if someone over here did that… it just wouldn’t be the same. You know… these little things have way more meaning and substance when they come from someone that has known you for so long.] Soon more friends arrived. In the end there was Matt & Liv, Tracey, the next door neighbours, T & her boyfriend, and Kristel and her new husband. I hadn’t met him yet, nor had I met her last 2 children!! I hadn’t seen her at all since our goodbye gathering three years ago!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was just insane to realise this!!!! I sat around all night and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I made sure that I had a decent conversation with everyone. I got lots of presents!!! I felt truly spoiled!! I got a bottle of wine, earrings (from the neighbours - I always get earrings from people who don’t know me that well. And it’s obvious they don’t know me that well, because they don’t know that I don’t actually have my ears pierced, lol!), nail polish, beeswax “glad wrap” (which I love), and amazing beautiful cards. I felt the love. Everyone was excited to see me and excited for me. We discussed all things Life. We talked about silly things as well as future plans and anything in between. It was an amazing, amazing night and I was oozing with gratitude all night.